I purchased the vanagon several years ago, sight unseen, in a "as is"  and not running. All I knew was that the engine didn't turn over.

    The original PO (not the middle man) was contacted about the truck and  told me that he thought the transmission was ok but that it seemed to  get into 2 gears at once. I queried this group about this and  there didn't seem to be much insight to the symptoms and since I had  not driven the truck as had nothing to offer.

    So upon starting up the engine, with the CV's disconnected something  was making some noise.

    So, the symptoms: When the engine runs it makes some grinding noises,  and I depress the clutch the noise stops. The noise seems to be getting  worse but maybe it's just my poor brain. Prior to installation I  drained the tranny fluid and didnot see much shavings but there was a  lot of thick gooy crap on the plug. Reinstalled the redline tranny  stuff.

    I am thinking of connecting the cv's to the tranny and getting the  linkage connected and driving it but thought I could get some input  first.

    So, any (all) of you tranny experts, what does it sound like?

    peter

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